Season 20
Season 20
Monday Aug 08, 2011
Think Spot
Monday Aug 08, 2011
Monday Aug 08, 2011
Think Spot - 8th August 2011
Matthew 6:14-15 "For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins."
God takes the forgiveness of others very seriously. Notice it does NOT say forgive others if they are sorry for hurting you, or forgive others if you can understand why they behaved in that way. We are to forgive everyone who has wronged us full stop.
In Matthew 18:21-22, "Peter came to Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?' Jesus answered, ‘I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.'"
Jesus meant that we have to go on forgiving someone who hurts us again and again... No matter how many times they hurt us. Forgiving someone means not telling others what they did to us so we can get sympathy. It means doing good things for them, praying for them blessing them.
Matthew 5:44 says "Love your enemies and pray for your persecutors."
Luke 6:35 says "Love your enemies, do good to them" and Romans 12:20 commands "If your enemy is hungry feed him."
If someone has hurt you so badly that you find you self replaying what they did in your mind. Try thinking of something kind that the person has done for you, every time their misdemeanour pops into your thinking. If that is not possible, then just actively think about something completely different. It will get to the point that you can think of the person without thinking of what they did, though this can take years.
Actually, like every other thing that God asks us to do, forgiving others is in our best interests. Being angry with someone else just hurts us - it doesn't affect the other person at all. Not forgiving leads to bitterness and resentment which eats away at us from within and can lead to physical symptoms as well. So forgiving others should be a priority if you're a Christian.
A prayer for this week: Father, thank you that you were and are willing to forgive us for the wrongs we have done against you! Help us with the power of the Holy Spirit to forgive us and also may we be willing to forgive ourselves and accept the forgiveness of others. Thank you for the cross of your Son, Jesus Christ, so that forgiveness is possible! We ask these things through the name of the Son, Jesus! Amen!
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Monday Jul 25, 2011
Think Spot
Monday Jul 25, 2011
Monday Jul 25, 2011
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Think Spot - 25th July 2011
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G'day! Welcome to Partakers Think Spot at the start of new week on Monday the 25th July 2011!
God's love in the Bible is seen as unfailing, everlasting, intimate, sacrificial, unbreakable, all-conquering, personal, great, immeasurable and all-knowing. This is seen supremely in the Cross of Jesus Christ, when He died for the sins of the world. Supreme love overcoming all that is not love. Even when great acts of evil are committed in the world, such as the slaughter of innocents in Oslo Norway this past week, love is all around. Love continues despite such acts.
How are Christians to respond to this love of God?
The apostle John writes in 1 John 4v15-16 - If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.
Our motivation as Christians is to love and to be love. This is a love, which is sacrificial and self-less. It is tough love which is of service to other people.
Loving and serving others, are the primary ways of showing you love God! It is easiest to love your friends. But Jesus commanded that his followers also love their enemies (Matthew 5:43-45)! Now that is very radical and can be difficult! We see constantly in the media and elsewhere, that regards our enemies, we are to be confrontational or at best to just ignore them!
Love and serve everyone
How is it possible to love our enemies? It is only with the help of God and His abundant grace towards us! We depend on the Holy Spirit who lives inside all Christians to empower and guide! To only love those who love you is what is expected by people everywhere as normal behaviour. But as a Christian, you are to do more! You are to be seen to love more than other people. You don't have to like others as friends, but you do have to love them as fellow human beings!
Go!
Go into this week, being prepared to show your love of Jesus Christ, remaining close to Him and serving other people generously with abundant grace-filled love! By loving and serving others, you become God's arms and legs in a physical world. One of the greatest limitations you face in loving and serving other people is a severe lack of imagination! So as you go into this week, ask God to expand your imagination to love and serve; as well as asking for the opportunities to do them. Loving and serving are hallmarks of an authentic Christian life. Love continues even amidst chaos and turmoil all around. Go and be part of the continuing of love. Thank you.
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Monday Jul 04, 2011
Think Spot
Monday Jul 04, 2011
Monday Jul 04, 2011
Think Spot - 4th July 2011
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G’day and welcome to Partake! Welcome also to Monday and our Think Spot together!
Happy 4th July to those in the USA!
C. Bronte once said “Life appears to me to be too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrong.”
Many people nurse a guilty conscience owing to holding onto animosity or wrongs done to them or having done wrong things to others. As a consequence, their life is filled with turmoil and bitterness. You may well be like that – I don’t know!
What I do know is that your conscience is the faculty which is sensitive to right and wrong, and judges your actions and attitudes. Everybody has a conscience and all are sensitive to spiritual truths, whether they are immediately aware of it or not.
According to the Bible, a clear conscience is essential for inner peace and joy, confidence in prayer, good health, effective service, .right relation-ships, effective witnessing, making right decisions, and victory in spiritual battle. A clear conscience is the inner joy and peace of spirit which results from having all personal wrongs made right with those whom a person had offended - either God or someone else.
However- many Christians carry around guilty consciences due mainly to unconfessed sins, affecting relationships with God, other people and themselves. If left unchecked, a conscience which is guilty, slowly grows 'dead', cold and silent. That is until such time that the guilt has been assuaged and put right.
If at the moment you are burdened by a guilty conscience, ask the Holy Spirit to show you clearly what is affecting your conscience. Then decide, at any cost, to clear it up in the power of the same Spirit. He will help you! Pray to the Father and ask forgiveness, (1 John 1:9), and fully accept His love and forgiveness. If there is anyone else involved, then you will also need to ask for their forgiveness (Matthew 5:23-24). Ask the Father to help you go, and the Spirit will help you, because one of the hardest things in the world to say is: “I was wrong! Please forgive me."
Your conscience can be cleansed because of what Jesus did on the cross! Hebrews 9:14 says “How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!”
Go into this week, ready to serve the living God, being confident that the Holy Spirit living within you, empowers you, is transforming you and desires that your conscience be clear. He will help you overcome if you ask!
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Monday Jun 20, 2011
Think Spot 20-06-2011
Monday Jun 20, 2011
Monday Jun 20, 2011
Think Spot - 20th June 2011
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G'day and welcome to Partake! Welcome also to Monday and our Think Spot together!
We have the start of a new week! Its Monday! How and in what circumstances are you trusting God? How did Jesus Christ trust in the Father? Jesus knew that the Father was going to bring Him back to life after his death on the cross. Jesus trusted the Father in this area of His life, just as he did in all aspects of his life. How are you doing? Do you have concerns and areas of your life where you need an assurance that God the Father will help you?
Here are some simple steps which may help you maintain a trust in God.
1. Pray, casting all anxiety on God. He cares for you because you are His personal concern (The great apostle Peter, one of Jesus' closest friends wrote this in 1 Peter 5v7 "Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.")
2. Accept and thank God that His peace has filled that area (Another great apostle, Paul, wrote this in Philippians 4v7 says "Then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.")
3. Learn to be content whatever your circumstances are, resting in God (Paul goes on in Philippians 4v11-12 "Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.")
4. Allow the Spirit to control your mind for life and peace (and again from the pen of the apostle Paul, this time in Romans 8v6 "So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace.")
5. Trust God to fulfil your every need (Matthew records these words of Jesus in Matthew 6v32-33 "but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need." )
6. Obey and follow God's commands to love God and love others (Jesus is recorded in Matthew 22v37-40 "You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.' The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.")
7. Finally, be prepared to be obedient to the Father, in supplying the needs of others you meet and therefore showing you love God and other people! One way to show you are trusting and loving God is to be the answer to the prayers of somebody else and showing that love to them! Ask God to show you, how you can help somebody else in need this week and showing your love.
Go in peace this Monday, into this week, knowing God is worthy of your trust! God will take care of you, but not always in the way you expect! Expect Him to allow circumstances and situations to arise where you are to trust Him fully! He will help you if you ask! After all, He knows you better than anybody! And don't be afraid to help somebody else because by doing that, you show you are loving and trusting in God!
Father, I pray that You would help us to trust in You and that You would supply our needs, calm our concerns and help us to love You and others more fully. I ask this through the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit who lives inside all those who have peace with you. Amen
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Monday Jun 13, 2011
Think Spot 13-06-2011
Monday Jun 13, 2011
Monday Jun 13, 2011
Think Spot 13/6/2011
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G'day and welcome to Partake! Welcome also to Monday and our Think Spot together!
Matthew 5:9 records Jesus speaking these words "God blesses those who work for peace, for they will be called the children of God."
All over the world, people share a common desire for peace! But what is peace? The peace the world wants varies from the peace the Christian knows. The world sees peace as the absence of conflict and people being generally ‘nice' to one another. Peace in the Christian context goes further, saying peace is perfect harmony with God, other people, circumstances and self. Therefore perfect peace will not come until Jesus Christ comes again, and takes Christians to be with Him.
That doesn't give us as Christians a mandate to sit around not doing what we can for peace, because we are commanded to be peacemakers (Matthew 5:9), our God is a God of peace (1 Thessalonians 5:23), and the Kingdom of God is about peace in the Holy Spirit (Romans 14:17). Peace is to be our business! In a world full of conflicts, such as conflicts between nations, conflicts between neighbours, conflicts even within families and conflicts within and between churches, Christians are to be peacemakers!
With that in mind, here are some thoughts on what the Bible has to say on peace, to help you this week be a peacemaker:
1. Peace with God
Justified by faith (Romans 5:1-2)
Christ is our peace between God and man and between men (Ephesians 2:13-18)
2. Peace with others
Live at peace with everyone (Romans 12:17-20)
Do everything possible which leads to peace and mutual encouragement (Romans 14:13-19)
Be a peacemaker - a sign of real wisdom producing a harvest of righteousness (Matthew 5:9, James 3:17-18)
3. Peace within/circumstances
Peace is a gift of God (John 14:27, 2 Thessalonians3:16)
Worldly peace requires manipulation of circumstances, God's peace comes regardless of circumstances
We have peace in troubled times - an untroubled, unfearful heart and mind (John 16:33)
Go in peace this Monday, into this week, knowing that the God of peace lives inside you if you are one of His children! Yesterday churches around the world celebrated the feast of Pentecost - the coming of the Holy Spirit as promised by Jesus. If you desire peace with God, with others and in all circumstances, ask this Holy Spirit who lives inside you to help you! If you would not consider yourself as one of His children, ask Him to help you become one!
Father, I pray that this week we will do all we can to be peacemakers and make a difference in world in conflict. I ask this through the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit who lives inside all those who have peace with you. Amen
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Monday Jun 06, 2011
Think Spot 06062011
Monday Jun 06, 2011
Monday Jun 06, 2011
Think Spot 6/6/2011
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Have you ever wondered what constitutes a growing church? Do you know that it isn't just a list of names on the church roll or a social club. Neither is it a large number of people who have made "decisions for Christ". So, what constitutes a church which is living and growing in both spiritual quality as well as numbers? Here are 4 pointers for you as a Christian to go into the week thinking about how you can contribute to the church you attend:
1. Full of 'Kingdom of People' - people who declare Jesus is Lord, reflecting His values in word thought and action.
2. Full of people who are filled with the Holy Spirit, that is people who allow their lives to be totally controlled by the Spirit, and letting the Spirit flow through them.
3. Full of people involved within their local community, utilizing their spiritual gifts for the glory of God.
4. People whose lives are oriented around
Commitment to Jesus Christ - following Jesus' commandments, and learning daily hww to be more like Him.
Commitment to the Body of Christ, the Church; Loving the Body and Bride of Christ just as Jesus loves the Church.
Commitment to working within the local community - utilizing the gifts God has given them (and everybody has them you know!) for the glory of God and exhortation of the other people.
There is no such thing as a full Christian life without those three things in the above set priority - Jesus, church, community. If the priority is shifted in any area then our priorities are wrong. Christians aren't to just to be Christians on a Sunday but 7 days a week. Not just to associate with other Christians, but to affect their local community throughout the week for the glory of Jesus Christ. To do this, this week, think about these questions:
Am I fully committed to Jesus and His teachings?
Am I fully committed to working within my Church?
Do I want the Church to grow in quantity and quality?
Am I fully committed to my local community and seeing Jesus glorified within it?
Go into the week, knowing God can use you to help extend His kingdom in your local community. Thank you.
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